Docket No. DCA 20-90

FINAL DECISION

The Postal Service seeks to collect a debt from John Kelly for a salary overpayment. Mr. Kelly received Continuation of Pay following an on-the-job injury, but his workers’ compensation claim was denied by the Department of Labor. Later, however, the Department of Labor reversed itself and accepted the claim. The Postal Service correctly canceled a debt for the original COP payments, but incorrectly paid Mr. Kelly for COP again. The Postal Service now wants to get that later, second payment back.
As discussed below, the Postal Service has proved that it overpaid Mr. Kelly. Further, the record does not support Mr. Kelly’s assertion that other deductions from his salary can be used to reduce or offset the debt. The petition is therefore denied.

FINDINGS OF FACT

1. Mr. Kelly suffered an on-the-job injury on January 2, 2020, and was not able to work at all times relevant to this petition (Tr. 119–21).¹ As provided for by law, the Postal Service paid Mr. Kelly his regular salary for the first 45 days following that injury. These payments are referred to as Continuation of Pay (COP), and in this case were made in Pay Periods 2–5 in 2020. The COP payments totaled $5,705.63 and covered 319 hours. (Resp. Exh. 1)
2. Based on his injury, Mr. Kelly applied for workers’ compensation benefits with the Department of Labor. The Department of Labor, however, initially denied his claim in March 2020 (Tr. 22, 124). The Postal Service, therefore, converted the COP hours to Leave Without Pay and sought to recoup the COP it had previously paid. (Resp. Exh. 1; Tr. 124). The process to recoup the COP began when the Postal Service issued a Letter of Demand on April 1, 2020 (Resp. Exh. 1). 
3. Mr. Kelly responded by filing a petition challenging the debt on May 4, 2020. Later, in June 2020, Mr. Kelly said that he was challenging the denial of his workers’ compensation claim. I therefore suspended further proceedings in this petition pending the resolution of that related case. (Order and Memorandum of Telephone Conference, June 17, 2020). Thereafter, in September 2020, the Department of Labor reversed its prior decision and accepted Mr. Kelly’s claim (Pet. Exh. 5; Tr. 125). In response to that decision, the Postal Service changed its payroll records to again reflect that Mr. Kelly was entitled to 319 hours of COP in Pay Periods 2–5 (Tr. 22–24; Resp. Exh. 3).
4. In theory, that action should have corrected—and eliminated—the alleged overpayment, effectively ending the matter, including this petition (Tr. 26). In reality, however, the problems that gave rise to this petition were just beginning. Yes, the original debt was canceled. But for some unexplained reason, the Postal Service not only canceled the original debt, but paid Mr. Kelly COP again. In total, the Postal Service adjusted Mr. Kelly’s pay for Pay Periods 2–5 of 2020 by paying him $4,786.15. (Tr. 33–37; Resp. Exh. 4). That is the amount that the Postal Service is now seeking to collect.

DECISION

There is no dispute that the Postal Service seriously erred when it tried to correct the initial COP debt following the Department of Labor’s decision to accept Mr. Kelly’s workers’ compensation claim. Instead of just canceling the debt, the Postal Service mistakenly paid Mr. Kelly $4,786.15. The fact that the payment was made in error, however, does not mean that Mr. Kelly is entitled to keep the overpayment—and even he does not strenuously argue otherwise. The Postal Service has therefore met its initial burden of proving that, through an administrative error, it overpaid Mr. Kelly. It has also proved the amount of that debt and that Mr. Kelly is not otherwise entitled to keep the overpayment. Dragoman v. United States Postal Service, DCA 16206, 2018 WL 1606054 (March 8, 2018).
Because the Postal Service has met its initial burden of proof, the burden shifts to Mr. Kelly to come forward with evidence to alleviate or offset the debt. Jackson v. United States Postal Service, DCA 20-187, 2021 WL 1390578 (March 22, 2021). To do that in this case, Mr. Kelly points to several deductions that were taken from his salary payments for Pay Period 18 through Pay Period 24 in 2020 (roughly August through November).² Mr. Kelly’s argument about these deductions fails for two reasons.
First, Mr. Kelly has not been able to tie his claim for the return of these deductions to the salary overpayment. Prado v. United States Postal Service, DCA 16-200, 2018 WL 1362944 (January 30, 2018) (holding that we may consider an employee’s affirmative claim only where the claim is so closely related to the underlying debt as to constitute a single debt). Second, the record does not support Mr. Kelly’s assertion that the deductions were taken to collect the debt underlying this petition. For example, Mr. Kelly points to a $1,590 deduction taken in pay period 21 of 2020 (Pet. Exh. 7 at 21). But a careful review of the payroll journal for that pay period (Resp. Exh. 4) reveals that the deductions taken were normal offsets from Mr. Kelly’s salary when his pay was retroactively adjusted for prior pay periods. Likewise, the other deductions cited by Mr. Kelly do not appear related to the debt at issue here.
I am mindful that Mr. Kelly does not have the burden to affirmatively prove why the deductions were taken. But here the record establishes that it is more likely than not that the deductions were not taken to collect the debt. Rather, they appear to be normal payroll deductions. I therefore conclude that Mr. Kelly is not entitled to any relief from the debt based on those deductions.

ORDER

The petition is denied. The Postal Service may collect $4,786.15 from Mr. Kelly by involuntary administrative salary offset. The Postal Service is reminded that rather than offsetting Mr. Kelly’s salary, it may negotiate a repayment schedule with him that does not cause him any undue financial hardship.